Thursday, April 8, 2010

T H E F A S H I O N S Y S T E M

"There are, then, for any particular object (a dress, a tailored suit, a belt) three different structures, one technological, another iconic, the third verbal. "

"To study the garment of Fashion would first be to study each of these three structures separately and exhaustively, for a structure cannot be defined apart from the substantial identity of the units which constitute it."

"'real' clothing is burdened with practical considerations (protection, modesty, adornment); these finalities disappear from "represented" clothing, which no longer serves to protect, to cover, or to adorn, but at most to signify protection, modesty or adornment."

"Only written clothing has no practical or aesthetic function: it is entirely constituted with a view to a signification"

"Thus far, we have referred only to Fashion magazines; this is because, on the one hand, descriptions from literature proper, although important in a number of great authors (Balzac, Michelet, Proust), are too fragmentary, too variable historically to be of use; and on the other, descriptions from department-store catalogues can be easily assimilated into the descriptions of Fashion."